Tiakina Te Taiao – Our Sustainability Monitoring Report

Tiakina te Taiao is our annual Waka Kotahi sustainability monitoring report.

An underpinning action in our sustainability action plan, Toitū Te Taiao, was to establish a sustainability monitoring framework and report. In December 2020, we published our baseline report, known as Tiakina te Taiao. 

Tiakina shows the impact that the land transport system has on our environment right now. We will use it to track progress towards a low-carbon, safe and healthy land transport system.  

Tiakina te Taiao – October 2021

Our second sustainability monitoring report, Tiakina te Taiao 2021 covers the period until the end of December 2020. 

It builds on the baseline report we released in 2020, including additional information on vehicles (micro-mobility and freight) and broadening the scope for public health and wellbeing (by adding heritage and mental health.

We have taken active steps towards meeting sustainable outcomes across the transport system since the last report including implementing the clean car programme, developing of a resource efficiency strategy, introducing of a new sustainability rating process for some large state highway projects and continuing to collaborate on national and regional mode shift plans.

While there are positive signs for mode shift and the uptake of EVs, the results highlight that there is more work to do across our activities to achieve a low carbon, safe and healthy land transport system.   

Tiakina te Taiao – October 2021 [PDF, 4.3 MB]

Results at a glance

It is not yet possible to see the impact of our actions but Tiakina te Taiao 2021 shows we have much to do.

For the transport system: 

• greenhouse gas emissions increased by 2.6 percent since 2018. Around half of these emissions are from urban areas
• more than 70 percent of local destinations like shops, schools and doctors could be reached by bike or e-scooter, but most (80 percent) urban trips are made by car
• it is difficult for people to reach workplaces by any mode other than driving and commuting distances have increased in all our major urban areas
• the proportion of trips made by walking, cycling or public transport decreased in Hamilton and Tauranga, but increased in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch
• imports of electric vehicles, e-bikes and e-scooters increased since 2018.
• electric vehicles make up less than 0.5 percent of the fleet in Aotearoa New Zealand. 

For our Waka Kotahi activities: 

• the weight of recycled materials we used in 2020 was similar to previous years at 15,000 tonnes (1.5 percent of the total materials used)
• constructing each lane kilometre of the state highway network generates about 2,200 tonnes of CO2 (equivalent) emissions and maintaining a lane kilometre generates about 68 tonnes each year. 

For our corporate sustainability we:

• successfully reduced our emissions, especially from business air travel which made up 82 percent of all Waka Kotahi corporate emissions in 2019/20, and
• increased the number of electric vehicles in our fleet (28 percent at the end of June 2021). 

Previous sustainability monitoring reports

Tiakina Te Taiao – June 2020 [PDF, 2 MB]